Monday, July 23, 2012

Review: The Dead Girl's Dance by Rachel Caine

The Dead Girls' Dance by Rachel Caine
My rating: 3.5 of 5 genies
Genre: YA, Vampires, Paranormal, Romance, Horror, Urban Fantasy
Published: April 3, 2007
Pages: 248
Publisher: Turtleback Books
Source: Library Loan
Format: Paperback
Purchase At: TheBookDepository.com or Amazon.com
Goodreads Summary

Claire Danvers has her share of challenges--like being a genius in a school that favors beauty over brains, homicidal girls in her dorm, and finding out that her college town is overrun with the living dead. When a local fraternity throws the Dead Girls' Dance, hell really breaks loose. Original.


My Thoughts

Not that The Dead Girl's Dance was a bad book or anything, but it definitely could have been better. I couldn't wait for this to finish. I think one of the biggest problems was character inconsistencies; many characters did many things far from habit and I'm not certain that they were all for the good of things.

For Example:

- Monica is crazy, but she definitely wasn't as threatening and the way she was kind of inserted near the end bothered me. Crazy Gina ended up bagging the psychopath award in this installment.

- I couldn't connect with Shane and Claire's relationship. Before they were this cute couple, I was convinced had genuine emotions and deep feelings for each other, but they just seemed lusty in The Dead Girl's Dance.

- Claire's thing for Michael seems a whole of a lot stronger than her relationship with Shane. When you date a guy, you should not be checking out his best friend I do not care remotely how hot/gorgeous he is. And then she proceeds to risk her life in trying to save him. W.T.F.???! One Stud at a time Claire, do not be selfish!

- Also, Claire's near-deal with Oliver was the biggest character regression and slap in the face. Remind me again how she is indeed supposed to be the smart one?

-Aw, shoot! I'm all sorts of disappointed. I geared myself up for some old-fashioned Monica Morell batty craziness and got zilch. WHY?? Bring the bitch back!

- Eve was so mean, I mean really, things for her were as cruddy as they could possibly be, but what happened to the sweet goth? She was snappy, cruel (at times), hard and suicidal. I wanted not once or twice, but on five+ occasions for the old Eve to come back.

I don't know why but I was expecting this to be as good as the first, the possibility of The Curse of the Second coming into play never really hit me until I was half-way into this book. The curse strikes again! BTW, whoever conjured up that little vat of voodoo suckiness is no small amount of twisted. Why can't every book after be as good as the first? Oh right, because I live in a world where fictional men aren't real.

What I liked:

- The writing was as good as ever, a little slow in some instances but still enough to keep me mildly interested.

- I wholly enjoyed Richard and he is by far the H.M. (honourable mention) character. Maybe because in this whole scope of inconsistencies he remained...well, consistent. My secret fantasy is for him and Claire to get together. Hey, a girl can dream.

- Sam is also an instant fave, he was so gentlemanly and awesome. *Sigh* I WANT TO STEAL SAM.

In Closing

Overall, I do believe that is it. The plot could have been more engaging, that's for sure, and I kind of detested the addition of Eve's diary at the end. Why weren't things with her brother/every other loose end tied up with the other part of the story? It wasn't a good way to go out.

But I think I will read the next a little after a break. Partly because I need the time away from Morganville and also, the person who has it requested before me is a little Quadruple Dipper. Yeah, I said it!

3.5 genies:


I couldn't make my mind up about you, you were almost there, almost perfect, but overall something was missing. Still a special piece of literature, though, 3 and a half genies.

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